Lawmakers target low-turnout summer elections set by schools, cities

By Jeremy Wallace, Austin Bureau

July 23, 2018
Updated: July 23, 2018 1:41pm

Photo: Mark Mulligan, Houston Chronicle / Houston Chronicle

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Voters use voting machines inside the Republican primary polling location at the Four Points by Sheraton on the Southwest Frwy at Wakeforest Drive, Tuesday, March 6, 2018, in Houston. ( Mark Mulligan / Houston Chronicle ) less

Voters use voting machines inside the Republican primary polling location at the Four Points by Sheraton on the Southwest Frwy at Wakeforest Drive, Tuesday, March 6, 2018, in Houston. ( Mark Mulligan / Houston ... more

Photo: Mark Mulligan, Houston Chronicle / Houston Chronicle

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Voters line up to cast their ballots at South Montgomery County Fire Station 4 on Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2015, in Spring. ( Brett Coomer / Houston Chronicle )

Voters line up to cast their ballots at South Montgomery County Fire Station 4 on Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2015, in Spring. ( Brett Coomer / Houston Chronicle )

Photo: Brett Coomer, Staff / Houston Chronicle

Lawmakers target low-turnout summer elections set by schools, cities

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School districts and other local governments are intentionally holding elections at odd times this summer to drive down turnout in hopes it will help them win voter approval for tax increases and bond issues, state lawmakers say.

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Local government leaders say they don’t set elections on odd days in hopes of a more favorable outcome at the ballot box, but the issue is fast becoming a new tension point in the sometimes adversarial relationship between local government agencies and the Republican-led Texas Legislature.

“There will be a response from the Legislature,” pledged State Sen. Paul Bettencourt, a Houston Republican.

Just last month the Klein Independent School District in Harris County held a tax increase election on June 16 — a Saturday. That was three weeks after Texas voters took to the polls forstatewide runoff elections on May 22. And three weeks before that, the city of Houston held a special election on May 5 to fill a city council vacancy.

Next up: South San Antonio Independent School District is holding an election on Aug. 14 in an attempt to raise the district’s property tax rate by 13 cents per $100 of taxable value, which would increase school taxes by $130 a year for the owner of a $100,000 home.

And on August 25, Harris County will ask voters to approve a $2.5 billion bond issue to cover the cost of flood control projects. That same day, voters in Floresville ISD, just outside of San Antonio, are being asked to approve a tax increase.

"It is preposterously bad public policy to spend taxpayer money to hold special elections in the dog days of summer that almost always have a low voter turnout," Bettencourt said.

Harris County Judge Ed Emmett shot back. “People who live in Senator Bettencourt’s senate district were affected by the flooding. He should be doing more to help them instead of worrying about election dates,” he said.

Assuming Bettencourt follows through with a bill, the clash over election dates promises to be yet another issue pitting state lawmakers against local government in Texas. Just last year, the state passed bills to restrict local government tree ordinances and annexation rules. And Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is moving to stop local governments from maintaining prohibitions against plastic shopping bags, armed with a June ruling from the Texas Supreme Court that struck down Laredo’s ban.

In the case of the Klein ISD, the June election cost taxpayers nearly $300,000 — it would have been considerably less if the district had waited for the November general election.

District officials say they needed the vote on the tax in the summer so they could plan next year’s budget. Critics of the tax hike said the timing of the election was a school board ploy to reduce turnout.

And low turnout is what they got— about 9,000 of 151,000 registered voters cast ballots, a turnout of six percent. However, the summer vote did not help the district win approval for the tax, which would have cost the owner of a $200,000 home an additional $157 a year. Voters shot it down by a significant margin.

Elsewhere in Texas, trustees at Keller Independent School District in Fort Worth announced they would go to voters on Sept. 8 — a Saturday — for a tax increase. Many other school districts around the state from McAllen to Copperas Cove are aiming for Sept. 8 elections, too.

School districts haveblamed the state’s diminished fundingfor public education as a key reason they are having to turn to local voters for more help. Districts say the state Legislature is not doing enough to keep funding up for local school districts, forcing locals to cut budgets or seek tax increases.

All of the elections should be on ballots at more traditional voting periods in Texas, said Bettencourt, aleader of the Republican Caucus in the Texas Senate, giving him a key role in setting the legislative agenda when the next regular session starts in early 2019.

State Rep. Mike Schofield, a Katy Republican, also voiced concerns about odd dates set for local elections, saying ideally they would all be in November when the public is used to voting and people are most engaged and likely to vote.

“If you have elections that few people know about, it’s like you’re trying to avoid the voters,” Schofield said.

Klein ISD superintendent Bret Champion said the district wasn’t playing games with the June election. The district was looking for the earliest possible date in order to have time to prepare for the next school year budget, whether the measure passed or failed.

If the district had waited until November, he said, the election would have been two months into the budget year and its failure would have forced adjustments with the school year already well underway.

“It was a budgetary reason, not a political one,” Champion said.

But for Dylan Glass, the timing of the election was a huge factor in making him rally his neighbors against the tax. The 20-year-old attended Klein schools and his mother is a former public school teacher.

But he said the timing of what he called “a pop-up election” felt like a trick.

“It didn’t seem right,” Glass said, addingthat many people had no idea an election was going on.

Bettencourt has also been critical of Harris County seeking approval for its flood control bond on Aug. 25 — exactly one year after Hurricane Harvey first came on shore in Rockport in 2017. Although Gov. Greg Abbott approved the emergency election date, Bettencourt has been critical of the election, saying it should be on the November ballot when more voters will be able to weigh in.

He said that would give voters more time to weigh what the county is asking for.

Emmett, the Harris County judge, has defended the Aug. 25 as the best time for the vote.

"It's the one year anniversary of Harvey. I don't think we want to go a year and not be able to say we're doing something,” Emmettsaid in May. “People who care about mitigation, resilience, flood control, they'll be energized and they'll want to go out. Will there be somebody who wants to stand in the face of what we went through during Harvey and say 'I want to be against it'? I kind of dare them to do it."

Bettencourt said when the Legislature meets in 2019, he’ll push legislation requiring all tax-related votes to be on November ballots.

Texas used to have 4 standard election dates, but in the mid-2000s that was trimmed totwo — one in May and the other in November. Bettencourt said governments should stick to those dates unless there is a clear emergency, such as when a member of Congress or the Legislature resigns.